Chase - The Actor

The 4th grade Christmas musical did not disappoint.  Chase was a football player ballerina.  Luckily, he's not the best ballerina!  It was fun to watch though.

Celebrating with his fan club after the show!

Let the Winter Fun Begin!

 Allie was clearly exhausted after her stay at MeMa and PaPa's house while we were in Disney.  Unfortunately, she was only exhausted for about 15 minutes before she was back to her usual self.  She has shared in more than her part of Christmas cookies this week.

 Taylor has been doing a little babysitting, which she clearly loves!

 Charlotte's looking at me like I'm crazy for passing her off to this kid!

She can't handle it all!

 The kids were super pumped for the first teacher pizza delivery night!

 They were super-duper pumped and really, really surprised when they got a bonus, accidental, second delivery!  But hey, the school got 2 tips out of us.  Maybe they did it on purpose?!

 The school also had it's first holiday market.  They even scored the "real" Santa!

 Taylor received a good citizen award for being respectful.

 She loved that the principal complimented her dress.

 Love that she knows to look at me even though no one else is!

 With her fellow classmate recipient.

 And with cousin Sarah!

 The annual Christmas parade.  My picture taking was rather slack this year but Taylor's outfit was too on point to miss a pic!

 Santa wraps it up!

 Straight from the parade to the Christmas musical.  Two of the wisest men around.

 Taylor brought along her number one fan!

 They rocked it!

 Taylor had basketball evaluations for the upcoming season.  I hope they don't judge on technique!

 The kids received a special early Christmas present from Jacob.  It came all the way from New Mexico - Official Air Force bears!

 Chase, not to be outdone by his sister, received an award for literature.  Who knew?!

 His fan club.  

 Hello.  Dog pictures.  Need more.

 We got an early dose of snow on Friday so we stayed in for the evening and did all the snow day activities.  Notice Dave is missing from these pics. He does NOT do snow!  He was grumpy after being "stuck" inside for 5 minutes!

Little bit of cookie, ridiculous amount of sugar!

Little bit of cookie, lot of sugar! 

 Snow!  We got quite a lot but it has been warm out so it didn't stick to sidewalks and roads and it was really wet and heavy and didn't pile up too much!

 It was the best kind!  Beautiful but maneuverable!  Dave was happy!

 We made it over to MeMa and PaPa's because the kids think that's the only acceptable place to play in the snow.  We didn't mind.  They served breakfast and lunch!

 And Allie always gets to go too!

 Finally the rest of the gang arrived!

Taylor finished off the snow day with a trip to see The Sound of Music with her theater pal, Julie!  Supposedly there is more snow in store this week....anyone want Dave!?!

Disney World

Warning: Disney overload coming your way.  I shared the highlights on Facebook but this is the whole shebang.  It might be more than you wanted to see.

 We got to town in the afternoon and arrived at Hollywood Studios around 5pm.

 First stop, food.  Of course.  Mickey pretzels were amazing.

 Toy Story was our first ride.  It was a solid start.

 More food.  We definitely ate all of the Mickey food groups.  Some more than others!

 Jingle Bell, Jingle BAM light show.  Amazing. 

 Much better than my pictures!

 Don't even remember what this was!  Lots of 3-D glasses were worn on this trip!

 Oh the Disney Photo Pass.  You pay them $ and then anytime you see a Disney photographer, you ask them to take your picture, they scan your magic band and then the pictures instantly appear in your Disney app on your phone.  Disney magic.  I was sucked in.....you'll see the proof!

 Lots of pictures.

 She acted like she was too old for Doc, but I knew better.

 Chase was thoroughly embarrassed.

 Star wars?  I don't even know.

 And Christmas lights, everywhere.  Give me all the pictures!

 My bud, Olaf.

 Last picture of the night!  We made it until the park closed at 9pm.  Just a taste of the pictures to come in the next few days.  And a taste of the miles to be walked!  We covered over 38 miles during our 3 and a half days there.

 Part of the miles came when we didn't successfully navigate the shuttle ride back to the hotel.  We ended up at Disney Springs which was less than a quarter mile from our hotel but it took us about 2 miles of walking to figure that out.  Got this nice picture of the Lego Lochness monster though!

 Day 2 was Animal Kingdom.

 Mt Everest.  Chilly.

 Don't even know his name but photo op with a bug at Animal Kingdom seemed like a must.

 Chase loved the photo ops.

 Chase was digging this photo op though!

 Hello Pocahontas.

 Avatar.  We didn't understand it or know anything about it, but it was cool.

 We found holiday Mickey and Minnie here!  If only we'd brought festive clothes!

 The safari ride was a big hit.  We went pretty early in the day and saw lots of animals out and about.

 Never had to wait for a rhino to cross the road!

 Here we are in line for the Bugs Life experience.  This is the last happy memory our kids have of this trip.  We thought it would be like you were a bug walking in the grass or something.

 Clearly not.  They both LOST it.  It was a 4_D experience with spiders falling from the ceiling, a wasp stinging you in the back and finally bugs crawling under your seat.  Too much.  It was bad.

 Luckily, a little lunch and monkey-watching and we rallied.

 Getting back on track!

 Made it past the bugs.  It's still fun to ask them about and I'm glad I took the picture of the tears!

 Daddy won a prize.  What a guy.

 More ice cream.

 We finished the day at Uno's for dinner.  We really only ate there for this dessert!  

 After dinner we went back to Disney Springs beside our hotel.  Since we knew how to get here this time it was much more fun!

 They had a Christmas Tree trail with SNOW!  The kids loved this FREE place nearly as much as they did the parks.  Go figure.

 Lego world was a hit.

 Hats and ears were purchased to make it an official Disney vacation.

 Many of these photos were at her request.

 More Mickey food.

 Kids' Dance Party.

 Back to the hotel in less than 2 miles!  Day two success!

 Day 3 - Epcot on Thanksgiving!

 It definitely didn't feel like Thanksgiving!

 Going under the sea.

 Manatees, the crowd favorite.

 We took the tour through all of the countries.

 Our favorite tourist.  He cracked us up.  I should make him do his own blog post with his pictures.  All of my pictures are of us and all of his are of things.  He was hilarious.

 Again, I know.

 Designing a vehicle at the Test Track.

 Space shuttle simulator.

 We were locked in this box with about a 5 minute delay before it started.  We were trying to smile.

 Thanksgiving dinner!  We had Japanese food and French dessert!

 It wasn't turkey but it had a great view!

 Sadness and Joy.

 Christmas card photo minus festive attire!

 Day 4 - Magic Kingdom   Breakfast of champions to go!

 It was supposed to have rain a ton while we were there but it ended up not raining at all!  This last day was cloudy with a fine mist falling so I made them wear the new rain jackets I'd bought for the trip and carried around all week!

 Splash Mountain.  Neither kid wanted to ride but we did.  Can't really leave your kids behind so we made them go.  Taylor was on board - even though it doesn't look like it.  Chase wasn't happy about it but was a trooper.

 We got stuck on the side of an uphill for like 15 minutes!!!!! Not exactly ideal for kids that didn't want to be there anyways!  Finally we got moving!

 And they loved it!

 And of course, we bribed them with ice cream.

 There were just a few people there with us!

 The kids opted for an early exit around dinner time instead of staying for the night parade.

 They wanted to go back to Disney Springs, again.

 It was a "magical" trip!

Rainforest Cafe at Disney Springs has a volcano that erupts every 30 minutes,  It was a highlight for sure.  Next time we're skipping the parks and just taking them here!

Good times.  Bless you if you read all the way to here!